Wednesday, September 10, 2008

In Medieval Japan, a breed of humanoid creature called the Kappa was believed at the time to dwell in rivers and swampy areas.It was a type of vampirelike lecherous creature that is more intelligent than the devilish, and less malevolent toward men.

They walked erect, though their extremities ended in webbed structures that looked not unlike claws. There hung down from their large mo­bile ears weird appendages resembling long narrow earrings. Their eyes were triangular and elongated, while on the top of the head there sat what appeared to some observers to be a bald spot, to others a big ball of yarn out of which stuck four lengthy darning needles.Whatever the case may be, legends have grown up around them suggesting that they are dirty; greedy and lazy-very much like some of the "wee folk" of the Celtic legends.

They are, however, extremely polite. So here is what you do: you will recognize a Kappa from the bowl-like depression on top of its head filled with water. This is its power source.

So you bow to a KAPPA in the approved Japanese fashion, and naturally having to return the courtesy it will bow back and the water tips out. It is then powerless until the water can be replenished.

This is not all. They are crazy about cucumbers. They prefer cucumbers to blood. Bribe them with a cucumber and they will promise you almost anything. And once a promise is made they are honor-bound to keep it.

Friday, May 16, 2008

The Dagda was the father God of the Celts they called him the Good God because he protected their crops. He was king of the Tuatha Dé Danann and ruled over Uisnech in Co. Meath. He had a cauldron called the Undry which supplied unlimited food and was one of the magical items the Tuatha brought with them when they first landed on Ireland. He also had a living oak harp called Uaithne which caused the seasons to change in their order and also played three types of music, the music of sorrow, the music of joy and the music of dreaming.

He was portrayed as wearing a brown low-necked tunic which just reached his hips and a hooded cape that barely covered his shoulders. On his feet were horse-hide boots. Behind him he pulled his eight pronged war club on a wheel, one end of the club killed the living and the other end revived the dead, and when it was dragged behind him it left a track as deep as the boundary ditch between two provinces.

Thursday, April 3, 2008

The legend tells so long time ago, when the Aztecs arrived to the Anahuac valley and mountains don’t have a defined form, there was born in the Great City Tenochtitlán a beautiful princess named Mixtli, only daughter of Tizoc, the "Tlatoani" (Great Lord) of the Mexicas. Many men wanted to married her and like them there was Axooxco, a bloody cruel lord who claims her; but the love of the princess belongs to a young poor warrior named Popoca.To gain the right to dispute the hand of the princess against Axooxco, Popoca goes on war campaign to win the highest title for an Aztec warrior: the "Eagle knight", this was a distinguished military class reserved only to the most noble and brave warriors of the empire.But many days and months pass without news and Mixtli died of sadness thinking her true love died on the battlefield, without the knowledge Popoca finally returned victorious.He took the body of her princess and goes to the mountain thinking she was only sleeping and maybe the snow could awakes her; he made a bonfire and he stayed aside on her feet waiting the moment to be rejoined again and this time forever. An eternal wait…But the story no ends here…Even if their bodies are gone, today you can still see them, if someday you visit the cities of México and Puebla State, watch the horizon and you can see two beautiful volcanoes one near each the other: The "Iztaccíhuatl" (sleeping woman) and the "Popocatépetl" (Smoking Mountain).Many centuries have past since then and the lovers stay there together… and forever.

Saturday, March 8, 2008

The water-fowls were flying over the marshy lakes. It was now the hunting season. Indian men, with bows and arrows, were wading waist deep amid the wild rice.

Near by, within their wigwams, the wives were roasting wild duck and making down pillows. In the largest tipi sat a young mother wrapping red porcupine quills about the long fringes of a buckskin cushion. Beside her lay a black-eyed baby boy cooing and laughing. Reaching and kicking upward with his tiny hands and feet, he played with the dangling strings of his heavy- beaded bonnet hanging empty on a tent pole above him.

At length the mother laid aside her red quills and white sinew-threads. The babe fell fast asleep. Leaning on one hand and softly whispering a little lullaby, she threw a light cover over her baby. It was almost time for the return of her husband.

Remembering there were no willow sticks for the fire, she quickly girdled her blanket tight about her waist, and with a short-handled ax slipped through her belt, she hurried away toward the wooded ravine. She was strong and swung an ax as skillfully as any man. Her loose buckskin dress was made for such freedom.

Soon carrying easily a bundle of long willows on her back, with a loop of rope over both her shoulders, she came striding homeward. Near the entrance way she stooped low, at once shifting the bundle to the right and with both hands lifting the noose from over her head.

Having thus dropped the wood to the ground, she disappeared into her tipi. In a moment she came running out again, crying, "My son! My little son is gone!"

Her keen eyes swept east and west and all around her. There was nowhere any sign of the child. Running with clinched fists to the nearest tipi's, she called: "Has any one seen my baby? He is gone! My little son is gone!"

"Hinnu! Hinnu!" exclaimed the women, rising to their feet and rushing out of their wigwams. "We have not seen your child! What has happened?" queried the women.

With great tears in her eyes the mother told her story.

"We will search with you," they said to her as she started off. They met the returning husbands, who turned about and joined in the hunt for the missing child. Along the shore of the lakes, among the high-grown reeds, they looked in vain. He was nowhere to be found.

After many days and nights the search was given up. It was sad, indeed, to hear the mother wailing aloud for her little son. It was growing late in the autumn. The birds were flying high toward the south. The tipi's around the lakes were gone, save one lonely dwelling.

Till the winter snow covered the ground and ice covered the lakes, the wailing woman's voice was heard from that solitary wigwam. From some far distance was also the sound of the father's voice singing a sad song.

Thus ten summers and as many winters have come and gone since the strange disappearance of the little child. Every autumn with the hunters came the unhappy parents of the lost baby to search again for him.

Toward the latter part of the tenth season when, one by one, the tipi's were folded and the families went away from the lake region, the mother walked again along the lake shore weeping.

One evening, across the lake from where the crying woman stood, a pair of bright black eyes peered at her through the tall reeds and wild rice. A little wild boy stopped his play among the tall grasses. His long, loose hair hanging down his brown back and shoulders was carelessly tossed from his round face. He wore a loin cloth of woven sweet grass.

Crouching low to the marshy ground, he listened to the wailing voice. As the voice grew hoarse and only sobs shook the slender figure of the woman, the eyes of the wild boy grew dim and wet. At length, when the moaning ceased, he sprang to his feet and ran like a nymph with swift outstretched toes. He rushed into a small hut of reeds and grasses.

"Mother! Mother! Tell me what voice it was I heard which pleased my ears, but made my eyes grow wet!" said he, breathless.

"Han, my son," grunted a big, ugly toad. "It was the voice of a weeping woman you heard. My son, do not say you like it. Do not tell me it brought tears to your eyes. You have never heard me weep. I can please your ear and break your heart. Listen!" replied the great old toad.

Stepping outside, she stood by the entrance way. She was old and badly puffed out. She had reared a large family of little toads, but none of them had aroused her love, nor ever grieved her. She had heard the wailing human voice and marveled at the throat which produced the strange sound.

Now, in her great desire to keep the stolen boy awhile longer, she ventured to cry as the Lakota woman does. In a gruff, coarse voice she broke forth: "Hin- hin, doe-skin! Hin-hin, Ermine, Ermine! Hin-hin, red blanket, with white border!"

Not knowing that the syllables of a Lakota's cry are the names of loved ones gone, the ugly toad mother sought to please the boy's ear with the names of valuable articles. Having shrieked in a torturing voice and mouthed extravagant names, the old toad rolled her tearless eyes with great satisfaction.

Hopping back into her dwelling, she asked: "My son, did my voice bring tears to your eyes? Did my words bring gladness to your ears? Do you not like my wailing better?"

The toad mother said within her breast, "The human child has heard and seen his real mother. I cannot keep him longer, I fear. Oh, no, I cannot give away the pretty creature I have taught to call me 'mother' all these many winters."

"Mother," went on the child voice, "tell me one thing. Tell me why my little brothers and sisters are all unlike me."

The big, ugly toad, looking at her pudgy children, said: "The eldest is always best." This reply quieted the boy for a while. Very closely watched the old toad mother her stolen human son.

When by chance he started off alone, she shoved out one of her own children after him, saying: "Do not come back without your big brother." Thus the wild boy with the long, loose hair sits every day on a marshy island hid among the tall reeds.

But he is not alone. Always at his feet hops a little toad brother.

One day an Indian hunter, wading in the deep waters, spied the boy. He had heard of the baby stolen long ago. "This is he!" murmured the hunter to himself as he ran to his wigwam.

"I saw among the tall reeds a black-haired boy at play!" shouted he to the people.

At once the unhappy father and mother cried out, "'Tis he, our boy!" Quickly he led them to the lake. Peeping through the wild rice, he pointed with unsteady finger toward the boy playing all unawares.

"'Tis he! 'tis he!" cried the mother, for she knew him. In silence the hunter stood aside, while the happy father and mother caressed their baby boy grown tall.